BBC Worldwide has confirmed the full lineup of baddies for this year’s Doctor Who Live tour.
Alongside the Daleks, the stage show developed in association with Steven Moffat will feature Cybermen, Weeping Angels, Judoon, Silurian, Smilers, Clockwork Robots, Winders, Scarecrows, Vampires and Ood.
The production is set in wartime Britain and ends with an on-stage battle. Doctor Who star Matt Smith will be incorporated into the show via an appearance on video screen.
Asked about his favorite villains, Smith recently told DS: “I love the Weeping Angels because I love the idea that it’s based on a game. I think they’re some of the most malevolent creatures. I love the Vampires, because they’re just really hot!”
The show will feature pyrotechnics, optical illusions and special effects alongside clips of the show and newly-filmed sequences backed by Murray Gold’s score played live by a 16-piece orchestra.
The full tour dates are as follows:
- October 8-10 – London, Wembley Arena
- October 12-13 – Sheffield, Arena
- October 14-17 – Glasgow SECC
- October 18-20 – Birmingham, NIA
- October 22-24 – Manchester, MEN Arena
- October 25-26 – Nottingham, Trent FM Arena
- October 28-31 – Cardiff, International Arena
- November 2-3 – Liverpool, Echo Arena
- November 6-7 – Belfast, Odyssey Arena
Doctor Who actor Matt Smith will do battle with Torchwood star John Barrowman in the best actor category at this year’s TV Choice awards.
Smith’s assistant, Karen Gillan, has also basgged a best actress nomination, while the show itself has been shortlisted for best family drama.
EastEnders, Emmerdale, Hollyoaks and Coronation Street are up for best soap.
Alexander Armstrong will host the ceremony on 6 September. Viewers can cast votes online until 9 July.
Teen drama
Smith and Barrowman share their nominations with last year’s winner Phillip Glenister, who plays, Ashes to Ashes’ Gene Hunt, and Jack O’Connell from teen drama Skins.
The E4 series drama also picks up nods for Kaya Scodelario in the best actress category and best drama series, where it’s up against Ashes To Ashes, Torchwood and Shameless.
Matt Smith appeared as a special guest with Orbital at the Glastonbury Festival last weekend.
A day after his first series of Doctor Who ended on the BBC, the star joined the electronic duo to close the Other Stage on Sunday, June 27.
The actor introduced the group’s version of ‘Doctor Who Theme’ and proceeded to don light glasses and join in the performance of the Ron Grainer and Delia Derbyshire tune.
“Yes, Glastonbury,” Smith said to the crowd. “So, 2010. Orbital, Orbital, you do the theme tune. Cool! Actually, the screen’s gone a bit wibbly. Can I have some glasses please? Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey, there we go, good!
“So Glastonbury, this is the last song of the evening people, if you’re lost… let’s make this one count! For Orbital, they’re back! For Glastonbury, we’re back! Let me hear you cheer, let me hear you roar, for Glastonbury!”
A brilliant end to a fantastic series! How long is it until Christmas again?
In the meantime, over in the gallery we have over 2,000 screencaptures from The Big Bang, almost 1,500 screencaptures from the corresponding Confidential and some episode stills as well.
Enjoy!
She has made a living hunting aliens. Yet Torchwood star Eve Myles found a friendly face as she returned to her old college to receive an honorary fellowship yesterday.
The Bafta-winning Welsh actress, from Ystradgynlais, was recognised by the city’s Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. She prepared for the honour by being dressed by Allie Saunders – a friend from her days at the college who now works in its costume department.
Myles, who plays Gwen Cooper in the hit BBC series, graduated with an arts degree in 2000. She accepted the honorary fellowship at a graduation ceremony in St David’s Hall.
The 31-year-old joined Peter Florence, director of the Hay Festivals Group, and award- winning theatre designer Richard Hudson in the roll-call.
Professor David Halton, who stood down as vice-chancellor at the University of Glamorgan in April, was also appointed college fellow. He oversaw the merging of Merthyr Tydfil College and the RWCMD with the university to form the Glamorgan Group.
Head of communications Mathew Talfan said: “It’s always great to be able to welcome back students and celebrate the success they have achieved since graduating. Eve seemed to be enjoying herself. It’s great for our graduating students to see somebody like that and think that in 10 years’ time, it could be them.”
More episodes in the Doctor Who: The Adventure Games series are being considered.
BBC Interactive Editor Iain Tweedale told DS that the corporation may develop more titles based on the success of the current four-episode run.
“We’re talking about it, yeah. Obviously we’re seeing how this goes, but we’re all very pleased with that,” he said.
“It really does depend on how the others do, and what the commissioners think abut what we’re going to achieve. It’s really about things like bringing in the wider audience as well as the hardcore gaming audience, and we’ve done some research that suggests we are actually hitting those people, which is great.”
Executive producer Charles Cecil added: “I think it would be great to see more. Obviously that’s for the BBC to decide, [and] I think probably a little bit more adventurous in terms of the puzzles.
“We went for a very, very broad audience with [the first episodes and] as you know there’s been 550,000 downloads, so it’s going go for a million probably within a month. So it’s been hugely, hugely successful and I think it has really reached all the objectives that the BBC has set it.
“Most of the people who would play a second one would have played the first one so they now know the grammar of how these games work. If we were going to do more, it probably would be a little more tougher in the adventure department. Not contrived, but just a little bit more challenging in that sense.”
The third episode of Doctor Who: The Adventure Games will feature original creatures.
Executive Producer Charles Cecil told DS said that the new monsters will be part of the official canon of the show.
“What you’ll also do is come across creatures that we’ve created, rather than, you know… they’re very much part of the canon… And they obviously go through Steven [Moffat] and this team, but we’ve got some really, really nice creatures,” he said.
“We had it one way or the other. One is that we’ve created creatures that could never be done in a million years on telly, or the other is create monsters that actually could be done on telly, so that it could go on telly. Because right from the beginning there’s a sense that this is very much part of the canon, Piers [Wenger, the show's executive producer] said there’s not 17 episodes, it’s 13 episodes and four interactive episodes, so we’re always seen as part of the canon.
“But yes, we’ve got some pretty cool monsters which you’ll see in the third one.”
Cecil also revealed that the coming episodes will adopt a formula like the first two – with one being stealth-based and the other having more exploration – and that the Tardis may play an important part at some point.
“I’ve got to be very careful, but all I can say is that wouldn’t it be cool to, as the Doctor, to be able to control the Tardis and do all sorts of cool things with the levers and launch it and everything. And it would be, and I’m talking hypothetically,” he said.
Second episode Blood Of The Cybermen will be available to download for free in the UK from Saturday.
The first episode of Doctor Who: The Adventure Games will be released outside of the UK in July.
BBC Interactive editor Iain Tweedale told DS that BBC Worldwide will release the episodes monthly through “third-party game sites” for a small fee.
It was also explained that the downloadable series was to be released later due to scheduling differences of the show.
“It was always intended to be a bit later. So in the US the series is running a few weeks behind the UK, so that kind of fits nicely.
“But there are some key events happening in the US that we will probably launch it around, big gaming events, and so that’s sort of the thinking there. But we obviously wanted to have it as close as we could between the two.”
Michael O’Mara’s children’s imprint Buster Books is to venture into fiction publishing for the first time with a title from “Torchwood” and “Doctor Who” star John Barrowman.
World rights were acquired from Gavin Barker of Gavin Barker Associates for an undisclosed sum to the as-yet-untitled novel.
Buster Books publishing director Philippa Wingate said that “probably another” title would follow and “hopefully many after that”. The first novel, to be aimed at children aged 9-12 years old, is lined up for paperback publication in August 2011.
It is the first time that the children’s imprint has strayed into fiction, although MoM has published adult titles such The Devil’s Graveyard and others by Anonymous.
“We’re very excited,” said Wingate. “It’s a new thing for us . . . We will use experienced fiction editors who have worked with celebrities before.”
Barrowman will write the novel with his sister Carole, who also helped him pen autobiographies for the independent, Anything Goes and I Am What I Am (both MoM). The novel will be sci-fi/fantasy, and the plot will follow a 13-year-old twin brother and sister.
BBC Books has also confirmed that Barrowman will also be writing a “Torchwood” tie-in novel, although it is as yet untitled and unscheduled.
Barrowman is set to star in a newly commissioned fourth season of “Torchwood”.
Matt Smith has admitted that he was nervous about taking on the lead role in Doctor Who.
Speaking at the BAFTA screening of last week’s episode, the actor revealed that he turned to his family for encouragement when he first started filming.
“I rang my dad and went, ‘Dad, I’m in trouble. There’s a lot of stuff to learn. The type of language it is and everything else’,” he said.
“I talked to my dad a lot through that first month. I just tried to be brave and to be my Doctor, whatever that is. I still don’t know what that is. I think it will change every day.
“I try to tell the truth every day in the way that actors do I suppose – do it my way, and not think about it.”
He added of being in the show: “To be part of it is a privilege and an honour – an overwhelming one sometimes.”
Doctor Who concludes with ‘The Big Bang’ on Saturday from 6.05pm on BBC One.
Copyrighted 2008 - 2012 The Medusa Cascade
Theme and design by Night Blooming Designs | Powered by Wordpress